A Trump defeat may turn it out to be an ugly show down despite all the security preparedness
by Prasad Nallapati*
The US presidential race is all set for a nail-biting photo finish.
Both candidates, Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump, appears to be equally poised as various poll surveys capturing their “marginal” leads fluctuating day to day.
It all now depends on who will be more successful in convincing late-deciding voters on the benefit of their policies and mobilizing them to go out and vote. Their campaign in the final stage focussed entirely on this segment of voters in the seven swing states that will determine the winner.
Over 70 million of the Americans, making nearly 50 per cent of the eligible voters, have already cast their votes in the early polling. Harris is said to be leading in these votes by a margin of eight percentage points, according to the New York Times surveys. Women form a majority of early voters. Men, however, favour Trump.
The former President is pinning all his hopes on winning the votes of disaffected young men who have not voted yet. They favour his financial policies but needs enormous persuasion to go out to vote. Harris, on the other hand, depends on female voters, particularly moderates and independents.
The gender gap is thus quite stark in this race. The final NBC News national polls show Trump winning men by 18 percentage points, and Harris gaining women’s vote by 16. Women are attracted to Harris’ policy on Abortion Rights, while Trump is leading with his economic and immigration policies, aided by male chauvinism among American voters.
The two are locked in close races in three of the seven swing states, Michigan, Georgia and Pennsylvania. Harris has a narrow lead in Nevada, North Carolina and Wisconsin, while Trump is ahead in Arizona. But these figures in all seven states are within the margin of sampling error, which means neither candidate has a definitive lead in any of them.
Harris’ vague policy on Israel’s war on Gaza is costing her dearly. Michigan, traditionally a Democrat strong hold, is home to about 240,000 registered Arab Muslim voters and a majority of them voted for Biden in 2020, helping him to a narrow victory over Trump. They are now opting for a third candidate, a Green Party representative.
Trump also made enemies of a sizeable number of Puerto Ricans in Pennsylvania and other swing states by making a controversial comment of it “a floating island of garbage.” Puerto Rico is an island territory under control of the US, but not yet integrated into its federal system.
Trump campaign, however, has made some additional gains elsewhere cutting into Indian American support to Democrats by attacking atrocities on Hindus and other minorities in Bangladesh.
Trump Prepares For Both “Victory And Defeat”
While the Republican campaign has already decided on their men taking over various official positions in a Trump administration and its policy documents, they are also laying ground to challenge the outcome of the election if it goes against him, claiming it a cheated verdict.
In his final speech on Sunday in Pennsylvania, Trump has said that he should not have left the White House after his defeat in 2020 repeating his earlier claims that the Democratic Party had cheated the vote.
Apart from a plethora of court cases in every state where he may lose, thus delaying the declaration of the vote, his party is also mobilizing its foot soldiers, the members of the “Proud Boys”, key instigators who had violently stormed into the Capitol Hill on January 6, 2021 to prevent announcement of Biden’s victory.
Quoting dozens of their social network accounts, the Wall Street Journal has stated that the far-right group and its state chapters are discussing potential responses to a defeat.
A Trump defeat may thus turn out to be an ugly show down despite all the security preparedness.
(*Prasad Nallapati is President of the Hyderabad-based think-tank, “Deccan Council for Strategic Studies”, and former Additional Secretary to the Govt of India)
